Posted on 23 Jun 2022
Prevailing sluggish sentiment coupled with falling and vanishing bids from buyers have led Indian mills to drop their hot rolled coil export offers. Moreover, Russia has started offering HRC in the Indian domestic market, further denting the sales scope of Indian mills in their own backyard. To counter the competition, Indian HRC offers have dropped by almost $60-70/tonne on-week, sources inform Kallanish.
Russia has reportedly offered base-grade HRC at $650/t cfr India this week. According to sources, buyers negotiated offers down to $625-630/t; however, the deal is not yet confirmed. According to another source, some 40,000 tonnes of Russian HRC are rumoured to have been purchased by Indian traders at INR 52,000-53,000/t ($664) cfr India, for July deliveries.
“Yes, Russia has offered HRC to India at a very low price; however, the confirmation on the contract is not yet out,” informs a senior trader. “I have heard they are trading steel in INR with India, so there shouldn’t be many payment problems unless the Indian banks decline to open LCs.”
Indian alloy-added SAE 1006 2mm+ HRC offers to Vietnam plunged further, by $20-25/t on-week to $715-730/t cfr Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), equating to $690-700/t fob India. An offer to Vietnam was heard at as low as $670-675/t fob India from an Indian private mill; however, it did not translate into a deal.
“Indian mills are dropping their HRC offers to stand among the competition,” says a source. “The market has become so uncertain … With the Chinese market falling, sliding offers in Vietnam and the Gulf, everything is indicating a market disaster.”
Indian structural grade HRC offers to Europe slipped dramatically to $770-780/t cfr Italy. A deal for 30,000t of structural grade alloy-added HRC was heard concluded at $760/t cfr Italy last week. Indian mills are heard offering at $800-810/t cfr Antwerp for small quantities.
Quotes for 2mm+ re-rollable grade HRC to the Gulf Cooperation Council and neighbouring region were noted at $750/t cfr Jebel Ali; however, buyers are heard preferring to wait and watch the market. They are bearish over initial quotes and expect deals to settle at $710-720/t cfr UAE given the current situation. A few mills are also indicating offers to Turkey at $760-770/t cfr Turkey, but buyers are unmoved.
“India needs to relook at their numbers [offers for HRC],” opines a senior source. “Current offers are not acceptable by the buyers and are not even close to Chinese offers. However, due to recent purchases of cheaper coking coal, their [mills’] cost of production will go down, starting next month. Let’s see if it impacts their HRC offers or not.”
Meanwhile, E250-grade HRC offers in the domestic market are heard at INR 61,000/t ($779/t) ex-Mumbai this week. Offers for E350 grade and GP are noted at INR 64,000/t and INR 69,000/t ex-Mumbai, respectively.
Source:Kallanish
